Whooping cranes released into Louisiana wild
December 7, 2015
Clayton Folse
December 9, 2015
As detectives continue their investigation of three fatal suspected heroin overdose cases within less than a week – developing a suspect in one instance – the march of drug users who survived playing chicken with the needle continues through the portals of local hospitals.
A Monday death in Schriever, at 145 Al Joseph Lane, is suspected to be from heroin, pending test results. The house is the same place where another man died under similar circumstances Friday.
Investigators believe the cluster of overdoses they are looking into stem from a single supply location that has not yet been identified, said Capt. Dawn Foret, assistant chief of detectives at the Terrebonne Parish Sheriff’s Office.
The overdoses are occurring, Sheriff Jerry Larpenter maintains, due to the purity of the product currently hitting local streets, believed to have made its way to the parish from Mexico.
“I don’t think the users realize the strength as far as the purity,” the sheriff said. “Before, you were getting heroin from the Middle East that was 22 percent pure, today it is 90-95 percent pure.”
Crackdowns on prescription opiates, including arrests of doctors, Larpenter and other law enforcement officials said, have turned people addicted to such drugs to turn to heroin.
People who have recently picked up illegal drugs and choose heroin, Larpenter said, may not realize the risk.
Thursday morning, TPSO officers responded to the Economy Inn in Houma and found the body of Christy Hurst, 35, inside one of the rented rooms. Hurst was pronounced dead on scene of an apparent heroin overdose.
Since then, detectives gathered evidence allegedly connecting 27-year-old Shantelle White, who has a history of drug-related offenses, to the case and a warrant has been issued against her for one count of second-degree murder.
She is described as 5-foot, 2 inches, 120 pounds, with brown-blonde hair. She is also sought for a parole violation.
“She is a known heroin user
and we can confirm that she specifically supplied the victim,” Foret said.
On Thursday evening, detectives were called to the Schriever address, where they found the body of 28-year-old Terry Braud Jr., also dead of a suspected heroin overdose. A companion of Braud’s described as a girlfriend, was rushed to Thibodaux Regional Medical Center where she was treated for an overdose and survived.
Larpenter said it was the first time he recalled two essentially unrelated heroin overdose deaths occurring on the same day.
In addition to those cases, detectives are investigating the overdose of an east Houma man who was taken to Leonard J. Chabert Medical Center as the result of a heroin overdose Sunday. Also on Sunday a Houma woman was rushed to Chabert after showing up at the home of relatives on Texas Gulf Road in Bourg suffering severe effects of overdose.
Detectives investigating that case determined that the drug in that case was heroin as well.
Earlier this year a Houma man, 35-year-old Jason Par-fait, pled guilty to negligent homicide in connection with the heroin overdose death of John Foshee, 27, in 2013.
The numbers of known heroin deaths in Terrebonne and Lafourche are small. But authorities have no doubt that increased volume of heroin in the region will lead to more.
The Terrebonne Parish Coroner’s Office recorded four fatal heroin overdoses in 2014. This year there were three, with the latest two potentially bringing the number to five.
In Lafourche, there were two confirmed heroin deaths in 2013, according to Coroner John King.
Heroin overdoses are not always easy to diagnose after death, however, said King’s investigator, Mark Goldman.
That’s because heroin metabolizes in the blood and is undistinguishable from other opiates within about three hours; heroin can remain in urine for eight hours.
But coroner investigators said that those who die of the overdoses often die in their sleep and are not discovered in time for a clear distinction to be made.
In addition to the deaths caused by heroin ingestion, authorities are concerned about the local flood of the drugs because some of the street violence reported in Houma neighborhoods over the past few months are believed to involve heroin trafficking. The price of the drug is cheaper than it’s ever been, investigative sources have said, leading to increased competition between drug dealers who work in close proximity to each other, sometimes servicing the same customers.
Survivors of overdoses – and clues from the deaths of those who used the drug but did not survive – are getting special attention by detectives, Foret said, in an effort to cut off the spread of the highly pure heroin at its distribution source.
Larpenter said users must pay heed the dangers these cases suggest.
“Once you are hooked, you have sold your soul to the devil,” the sheriff said.
Larpenter said anyone with information on White’s whereabouts or in relation to the other cases should call Crimestoppers at 1-800-743-7433 or TPSO at 876-2500.
Shantelle White, 27, is wanted for second-degree murder, after supplying a local woman with a fatal does of heroin.
